I’M PLEASED FOR KIEFFER IN SO MANY WAYS –BOSS
NEIL Harris has praised the impact of Cardiff City’s summer signing Kieffer Moore after the striker bagged a brace in a much-improved team performance to earn a 2-0 win over Nottingham Forest.
The Bluebirds started their season in sloppy fashion with a 2-0 home defeat by Sheffield Wednesday last week, conceding two lax goals and not doing nearly enough in the final third to make inroads.
Against Forest, though, it was quite the opposite and new recruit Moore had a big hand in that.
But it was not only Moore who Harris was impressed with, it was how his team responded to ripples of criticism last week following a frustrating week or two to begin the campaign.
“I’m really pleased in so many ways,” Harris said.
“Firstly, I’m pleased for the big man. When you come into a club he was desperate to play for, for so many reasons, you are really pleased for a striker to get off the mark.
“His all-round performance was excellent. Not just the goals, his linkup play, first contacts, athleticism were excellent.
“I thought the team’s response to a little bit of criticism, because we hadn’t started very well, and I thought the focus, mentality, everything we had worked on, on and off the pitch, came to fruition.”
The £2m signing from Wigan has certainly seen his stock rise over the last 18 months or so, given his exploits for both club and internationally with Wales.
His arrival came with much fanfare and now his account with the Bluebirds is up and running, City fans will hope he continues in this rich vein of form. Harris, too, said Moore has to keep his standards high because Cardiff have three hungry strikers lying in wait, wanting to grab that shirt off him.
“Goals will come for him, we have
got to learn to use him correctly, as we did for the majority of the game today,” Harris added.
“He has got to keep pushing himself because he has Robert Glatzel, Callum Paterson and Mark Harris right behind him, champing at the bit to play, so his standards have to stay at the levels they were today.
“We also have to keep improving as a team, because we showed postlockdown how good we can be and we didn’t show that in the first game against Sheffield Wednesday, but today we did again.”
While Moore’s double will, of course, dominate the headlines, it was pleasing to see just how defiant City were when their backs were against the wall in the second half.
Forest launched attack after attack at the City goal, but the Bluebirds stood firm for that all-important clean sheet, a feat they had not managed in their first two outings of the campaign.
Harris still wants his team to tighten up a little bit, there were a few close shaves which kept Alex Smithies on his toes, but the manager was pleased with how his players coped with Forest’s sustained pressure in the second half.
“We threw ourselves in front of the shots, we stood up to a good pairing in (Lewis) Grabban and (Lyle) Taylor up front and defended well when we went to five at the back.
“Other than Leandro Bacuna’s slip, we didn’t give much away, so I am really pleased with a clean sheet, as much as I was pleased with Kieffer’s two goals and the chances we created.”